Sunday
Jan232011
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Matt on 'bat
Jan 23, 2011 Media A few days back I climbed down rather on the George Monbiot advocates violence thing. Interestingly, Matt Ridley has recalled an incident when he was on the receiving end of one of GM's diatribes, which was delivered in the following terms:
Crucifixion wouldn't have been good enough for him.
... which does seem rather oddnow that George is calling for an end to vitriolic abuse and calls to kill people.
Reader Comments (25)
HauntingTheLibrary takes a couple of shots at Monbiot.
http://hauntingthelibrary.wordpress.com/2011/01/23/flashback-2002-monbiot-quotes-director-of-hate-group-to-claim-veganism-by-2012-needed/
Another great title. Another aspect to consider with 'bat was his attitude at the debate at Free Word with James Delingpole in early December 2009 about whether it's ever right to equate a AGW sceptic with a holocaust denier - and they had chapter and verse from the works of 'bat. The debate inevitably was hijacked by everyone to discuss Climategate, which had just broken and that made it one of the most memorable such events I've ever attended. But to the extent John Kampfner - head honcho at Index on Censorship - made George and James stick with the original theme, George did 'sort of' apologise for the famous time in writing he made the comparison. And then he 'sort of' went back on the apology.
I mention because I consider the denier meme akin to violence. (I take a strong line of this.) And of course George uses it within a sentence or two of starting his latest piece against violent language. Plus ca change ...
But hang on a moment. The place where Monbiot says
he's in the middle of a review of Ridley's latest book and it's far from a favourable review. But George Monbiot is clearly not saying crucifixion would be too good for Matt Ridley. He's talking about a hypothetical author in a hypothetical situation and what the evil business/banking community would do to such a person.
We've got to stop doing this with Monbiot. We may find him annoying but taking 'threats of violence' out of context, which turn out not to be, doesn't do serious debate any good at all.
Just talking of 'deniers' of different kinds being compared to sceptics,
BBC's Horizon suggests science is under attack tomorrow and the denier word creeps into the preview
BBC compares denial of HIV virus in causation of AIDS, to climate sceptics, and the clips presented suggest Sir Paul Nurse(Royal Society) wants scientists to win peoples hearts and minds using the media rather than have them understand the science. Lest others fill the gap with politics and ideology of course, AKA the Royal Society et al.
Will watch with an open mind but an interesting spin on how science should be understood by the public (or not).
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00y4yql
Richard, I think that the issue continues to be the shrill tone and the harshness of the language. It really doesn't matter if the target of George's vitriol is unnamed, hypothetical or wholly imaginary. He, who calls for an end to the language that normalises violent action, does have a history of using that very same language frequently in his writing.
Every time I see a pic of GM,
I ponder,
and then,
I wonder..
What does GM actually stand for..?
Genetically Modified perhaps..?
Peter Walsh
Simon, I agree Monbiot's language is intemperate, given the context. In other words, I don't think big business is that bad, in the West, most of the time. But the crucial point is that Monbiot is not suggesting that violence against Matt Ridley is justified. He's even remotely suggesting that. Mr Ridley has misled the Bishop (and for a moment did the same for me) when said
That's not what he said. Sorry Matt, Bish and all.
The trademark for both Monbiot and Delingpole is the provocative device. Its just that their self confidence in the veracity of the evidence underpinning their respective missions has been dramatically divergent this last year- Delingpole's has skyrocketed, Monbiot's has collapsed. Not a happy man.
Bottom line Monboit attacks others for what he is more than happy to do himself , his call for a truing down ‘heat’ in the discussion stands in stark contrast to his actions in attacking those that don’t support AGW . The guy has got a ego you could land a jumbo jet on and it leads him to think he simply cannot be wrong.
Best example of him at work , he attacked a piece of research of bees , only to find the researcher involved turn up on CIF and take him to bits on the article as it was clear Monboit had simply not really read it.
Richard, Monbiot is careful. He's not writing directly about Ridley, but he is talking about someone that Monbiot likens to Ridley, doing what Monbiot accuses Ridley of doing.
In order to avoid accusations of threatening language, instead of saying to someone "I'm going to saw off your head and stick it on a pike", you can side-step the legal implications by prefixing with "If it weren't Sunday, I would saw off your head and stick it on a pike"
There are several clever ways to side-step the ramifications of speaking in a menacing way by carefully and subtly making direct-sounding threats into legally indirect threats. I suggest that this is a mechanism that Monbiot uses very deliberately and - because it's clearly premeditated - makes his writing in this style even more egregious.
Richard Drake is right. Monbiot is a cheapskate bully with an ego bigger than a Vestas V90 but he will not be politically defeated by trading childish insults.
Sceptics rightly object both to the epithet “denier” and its overtones of Holocaust denial and to relentless suggestions that we are in the pay of “big oil”. (Not least because, unlike many AGW proponents, we struggle to pay for small deliveries of same.)
I’d venture to suggest that the term “eco-fascist”, currently favoured by many who should know better, is just as bad, maybe worse.
True, as with any burgeoing ideology, there is a strong authoritarian strain in the AGW agenda. But “fascist”? Come on. Some stupid strumpet making silly films about zapping footballers is scarcely Brownshirt material. Unpleasant? Yes. Bad Taste? Without a doubt. But “eco-fascist”?
Ironically, many of those who use the term seem to be unaware of the well-researched historical links between the extreme political right and sections of the environmental movement. They certainly seem able to segue rapidly to describing the same people as “leftists” or, even more fatuously, “watermelons”.
Two points. First: if critics of the AGW agenda want to win the moral high ground, they need first to win it. We won’t do that with silly “Yah Boo” games.
Second, I am convinced that the AGW agenda will in time give rise to movements of the very far right indeed. (Straws in the wind here being the increasing popularity of “population control” politics and proposals made in all seriousness for rationing electricity by means of coupons not just profiteering.)
Crying “Wolf!” won’t hack it.
Bish,
Richard Drake is right about the original Monbiot phrase. It was rhetorical. And Matt seems to have missed that as well. Too bad.
Our language is full of violent metaphors, "shot down" "took a hit" "Killed them" in connection with effect of successful comedy act, "broke a leg" from theater.
It could be that those which are everyday figures of speech should get a pass. When the language is new, evokes violence, and is definitely not a figure of speech that we should be concerned.
Monbiot's protests call to mind a TV movie from the late Fifties. The stars were Don Knotts and Phil Silvers who played "the slowest guns in the West." When one of them arrived in town, all the gunslingers disappeared for fear that they would be challenged by the slowest gun in the West. I think Monbiot could clear a town of assassins faster than Don Knotts or Phil Silvers.
I feel sorry for George. He's discovering that he's been lied to by so many of his once-trusted confidantes that he doesn't know what to think anymore.
He's currently in a no-mans land between uncertainty and panic.
Of course he's thrashing around just now. In the end he'll sort his head out and make the right decision for him.
I believe he is an honest reporter of what he sees. But what he sees is changing.
Give him time.
Smug is the word. George, if I may call him that, has a devoted following on the pages of the Guardian, and takes their sycophantic ecstacy of his words as proof of his omniscience. For my part I don't mind being called a denier, it is clear evidence of the paucity of the case for AGW that 'Bat and others, not too up with the science, need to describe those with contrary views in terms of the holocaust, AIDs, creationism etc. GM has no problem with the word denier, he never has and is quite frank about it. Personally I don't know if he recognises that the use of the word in front of his juvenile pack of disciples dehumanises the people he is referring to, or if he does, I don't know if he cares, but you only have to read the posts under his column to understand that he has a following of extremely immature young men who hate deniers with a vengeance. If he has realised that it hasn't shown in his writing.
He claims he gets at least one death threat a week, personally I don't believe him, he may have had death threats, but one a week? I doubt it. In any event I've invited him to print the death threats with addresses and all, and let them go viral, I'd cheerfully help the'Bat to nail one of the bastards. Who wouldn't? But I find with all the warmists that they are peculiarly diffident about sharing the death threats they receive with us. It surely doesn't reflect badly on them if there are nutters out there threatening their lives, but they won't show and tell. Funny that.
@ DaveB
"I’d venture to suggest that the term “eco-fascist”, currently favoured by many who should know better, is just as bad, maybe worse. "
Nor is terribly euphonious, DB. How about "Warm-Monger"? (An idle thought prompted by Blair's most recent public appearance.)
J ferguson
I agree that Monbiot was not calling for Matt to be crucified - but I think his article does count as vitriolic abuse.
Elsewhere I've listed some threats and attempts at harm that befell self and family when I was prominent opposing the anti-uranium nuts in the 70s. It's real, it happens. Then, on seeing "crucifixion" above, I recalled some verse I (ahem) wrote about then:
Self-crucifixion, symbolic, it fails
There’s no known way
To drive in the nails.
Geronimo doubts that George has had regular death threats, on the grounds that he has not revealed everything he knows about them. Well, I have no reason to doubt he has had death threats, he has described some of them in some detail in various articles, and I can think of some reasons why he may not wish to publish them with full details (publishing peoples addresses may be of dubious legality). Other prominent AGW proponents have claimed to have received death threats (e.g. Phil Jones), and I have no reason to doubt that either. Among the people who think that AGW is entirely and only about fraud, there are some rather excitable people. I think it does not do the sceptic community too much credit if we are sceptical of these claims. It is quite easy to be glib about such matters when others are involved - but if the truth be told, very few of us would not find it very unpleasant to receive such direct, personal, threats oneself. And cutting the guy a bit of slack on this doesn't stop us thinking he is wrong about AGW and a rather blustering bully in the way he is wrong about it.
I was speaking at an event last week and the chairman said in his introduction that George Monbiot called for me to be crucifed. I had half-forgotten that, so I looked it up afterwards: it's carefully worded to be hypothetical but it's in an article entirely about me and describes the hypothetical person doing what he thinks I did. Of course, I don't think he actually wants me nailed on a cross to die. But it's not something I would write even in jest or hypothesis. And I would never have brought it up again if he had not that very day put out his demand that people stop takling about hurting and killing those they disagree with.
@ Geronimo -
I disagree. Fascism is a very pejorative term, but it is one that is applicable to some in the green community. Fascism, as defined by Oswald Moseley, was "socialism plus nationalism" - in other words, it combined socialist ideas with nationalistic ideals.
This is pretty close to what many in the green campaigns are calling for when they talk about "bio-regionalism" which is really just euphemistic.
There is a very great apparent need for authoritarian figures displaying 'strong' leaderership in the green movement, just as there seems to be in most political movements to the left of the centre. Monbiot obviously realises this and fashions his rhetoric on 'strong' language in the style of Mussolini and Mosely, rather than on proven science to support his cause. The Green movement itself is based on a Fascist political urge to control everything and not on a desire to ensure the environment is respected and cared for, which is one of the reasons that the continuing Australian floods and recent bushfires have been excacerbated by Green action and legislation. Monbiot's adherents on the Guardian's CiF only pretend to discuss, but will not and cannot recognise an opposing point of view or treat that view with respect. Monbiot rather takes advantage of his unsocialised adherents, some of whom even style themselves as 'attack dogs'; consequently, any sort of rational and/or civilised debate has no chance in CiF.
One of the frequent targets of Monbiot's faithful is Jeremy Clarkson, a professional Iconoclast who knows his attitudes and views offend Green sensibilities to the point of apoplexy, which he plays upon unmercifully.
It's Monbiot's hypocrisy that I object to most. How he phrases it is (almost) immaterial, and I daresay he makes the abuse indirect simply to avoid litigation.
The AGW promoters and hanger-ons like Monbiot, Suzuki, Hansen, Rom, etc. etc. etc. had no trouble with 'vitriolic language' when they were unchallenged or winning in the public square.
Now they are shown to be frauds and liars. And it is obvious that in Australia and the UK, at least, that the national weather services are corrupted by fixation on AGW inspired thinking. People are waking up and noticing that the promised apocalypse is not happening.
Now it is suddenly over heated and unfortunate to use vitriolic language?
Boo.. Hoo.
Matt Ridley: all power to your elbow, mate. I want you to win the argument and yesterday I didn't think this helped. Today, I agree that it's a ghastly thing to say, partly because (like so much of Monbiot) it assumes and generalises evil in big business, instead of being specific. The simple truth is that not all businessmen (and women) are the same, because not all human beings are.
A stunning example for me is the story of DDT. In the wake of the Channel 4's What the Greens Got Wrong, Monbiot fell for a ridiculous conspiracy theory where DDT was being pushed by Big Money - an idea he picked up from an article by Tim Lambert and John Quiggin in 2008 which had been completely rebutted in the same issue of Prospect Magazine by Roger Bate. My blog post later in November has details.
What I've learned since underlines the point. DDT is now out of patent and no big business is interested. But even before that, J.R. Geigy, the company that discovered the properties of the "Excellent Powder" in the 1930s, was particularly generous in its licensing policy, believing that such a boon to human health and well-being should not be exploited for maximum profit.
I know this, like many things, through "The Excellent Powder" by Richard Tren and Donald Roberts. I can't recommend it highly enough. No book on AGW (and it doesn't mention it) has shed more light for me on what's gone wrong with AGW. Be that as it may, Monbiot gets his facts spectacularly wrong in that case. One for the notebook.